November 01, 2009

Traffic Pumping or Pimping

Let.s face it, if you use GoogleVoice like I do, you have the benefit of a very reliable, easy to use, one number solution with voice mail, message transcription, with an elegant call back solution that offers convenience and capabilities not currently offered by any on the US local carriers or mobile operators in one complete package. So I found the Randy Stross penned story in today's New York Times very thought provoking.

To get all the features that GoogleVoice offers one would need Comunikate, PhoneTag and a subsidy by some service provider, as the calls made via the Google Voice application that end up on a landline or to Gizmo's softphone are really free (other than the cost of access to a network) so in essence GoogleVoice is democratizing voice serrvices, and at the same time taking potential revenues away from others who don't offer all of the functions in one place.

As a public service, subsidized by ad revenue, GoogleVoice makes thins easy for people to get services that otherwise would need to come from many different service providers, and not all work well together.

Honestly, GoogleVoice, now with SMS would be worth paying for,if for no other reason than to shut the door on these types of issues between operators and the FCC so they all can get on with bigger issues, like making broadband available to all.

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I think Google Voice is an excellent application however it is useless with out interconnection to the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN). Interconnection cost money because the PSTN is a per minute network. Each time Google Voice connects to your land lines Google Voice pays for the connection. This is the reason why Google Voice does not want to connect to what they call High Cost Destinations (thus why they are not connecting you internationally).

I am not sure how they plan on paying these expenses in the future maybe advertising based on you phone calls and the ability to track conversions from phone listings, but the point is they are paying now.

The applications found in Google Voice have all been done before maybe not all together but probably, remember Google bought Ring Central to get this started.

The reason Google Voice is so attractive is that it is FREE!

But here is the problem it's only FREE because Google is paying for the interconnection to the public switched telephone network to connect to your various devices.

So Google is buying customers!

Google is willing to pay so that they can attract customers not for new never done before services but because they are FREE and no one on Earth but Google could afford to do this on such a large scale.

It sounds good for the user when you think it is FREE.

But what if Google had to say:

"This service has cost paid on your behalf by Google so that Google can track your calling patterns, search for keywords in your calls and be more selective in the advertisments they place in front of you! It may not be free forever we don't know how much it will be in the future or if this model will even work."

I think the consumers would be less likely to make their new Google Voice number the ONE number that is tied to their devices, posted in directories/phone books and friend's phones.

What if the cost are too great for even Google to connect. Right now Google has over 500,000 active customers in which Google has to pay for their connectivity between their Google Voice number and various telephone connected on a per minute basis for the time they are connected.

If the question is... Will Google Voice eventually block calls if they can not afford this really big idea? THE ANSWER IS YES, they will start blocking calls with the High Cost Areas first and then....

All calls are High Cost when you are not charging for them!

Selling a service for less than your cost for an extended period of time is purely ANTI-COMPETITIVE!!!

PURELY ANTI-COMPETITIVE.

So while user of Google Voice will fight for Google Voice the question is would they if they had to pay?

I agree with you that Google Voice is an excellent application and worth paying for but only if they allow you to forward calls to an international number. Right now, Google Voice is utterly useless to me. I have two mobile phone numbers, one in the US and another in the Netherlands. When I am traveling I use my Dutch number. I'd like to use Google Voice to ring my Dutch number. But I can't do it right now. That's why I have not been impressed (yet) with Google Voice and I find that it has received a disproportionate amount of hype.